200 live tarantulas found in suitcase at Dutch airport

PA

Customs officials at Amsterdam's Schipol Airport confiscated over 200 live tarantulas hidden in a German couple's suitcase.

According to news.com.au, a customs officials said in a statement released by Finance Ministry: "Customs at Schiphol airport found 200 live tarantulas and an assortment of other insects including bugs, crickets, grasshoppers and millipedes.

"The animals were collected by a German couple on a recent trip to Peru and were put in plastic containers and tubes hidden in their clothing and shoes."

AFP reports that a criminal case has been opened up against the German couple, and that the arachnids and various other creepy crawlies have been handed over Dutch animal welfare authorities.

Finance ministry spokeswoman Lindy van Galen told AFP: "Animals are regularly smuggled from other countries to the Netherlands, but never in this quantity."

Just last month, a smuggler was caught trying to hide a live Loris monkey in his underwear at India's Indira Gandhi International Airport.

The suspect from the United Arab Emirates, who was detained along with two other travellers, had arrived from Bangkok, and was about to board a connecting flight to Dubai on Jet Airways.

And, in August, a British holidaymaker was stopped at Cardiff Airport when she returned from a trip to Morocco with a handbag made from a WHOLE iguana.

The bag, which included the animal's head and claws, was quickly confiscated by custom officers as iguanas are on a list of endangered animal skins and is illegal in Britain.


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